


Ship on Fire

by Ossicle



Category: One Piece
Genre: Dubious Science, M/M, Protectiveness, Swearing, gruff fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-14
Updated: 2017-05-14
Packaged: 2018-10-31 15:37:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,961
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10902309
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ossicle/pseuds/Ossicle
Summary: Kidd and Law spend a quiet evening testing some unexplored aspects of their powers. Killer hovers, frets, and keeps things from exploding too much.Some sweary, gruff, pirate fluff, told from Killer’s long-suffering perspective.





	Ship on Fire

**Author's Note:**

> 1) I’ve tried to leave a lot ambiguous here, such as the time (early timeskip?), place, state of Kidd and Law’s relationship. 2) I don’t even know what who where how do a science, so I’m sorry if my vague cobbling of physics and fantasy pains your brain. Just… go with it. 3) I spelled it 'Kidd' cuz I like it better that way.

The early evening quiet had stretched into its second hour before Killer’s motherly instincts started dinging. The first mate tensed as he lounged on the gundeck polishing his blades, and listened. There was the usual creak of the ship’s rigging, the steady surge of the water, Wire patching sail next to him, muffled laughter from below … yeah, quiet. Shit.

Once he put a hand to the floor he could sense something else under the quiet: a buzzing hum, modulating unevenly in a way none of the ironclad ship’s clunky machinery did. Or shouldn't, since they were running under sail, not steam. The Captain was usually super tuned into this stuff – could hear the shift in the music of it if even one rivet loosened – but, well. He’d had this new distraction recently. A distraction named Trafalgar Law. That certain facial muscle twitched again under Killer’s mask.

 _Ugh. Shit. Better go check on the idiots._ He grumbled internally as he rose to go deal with whatever the fuck this was.

Wire stretched his fingers, “What, hear something?”

“No.”

“…shit. Better go check on the idiots.”

“Yeah.”

Killer climbed up above deck and strode aft, stomping a little to announce his presence. It was dark and clear, the wind subtle. He could feel the hum on his face now, a buzzing beat in the air that made his blood pressure surge. He could smell an acid bite behind it. And… something else. He walked faster. _Those idiots._

He approached the stern to see two backs hunched in concentration. They were backlit by a translucent blue sphere hovering just above the deck -- Trafalgar’s so-called “Room.” Inside the sphere something small, dense and dark spun rapidly, a red glow beginning to bloom in shifting patches over its surface. Heat radiated from it and made his breath go thick in his mask. He stopped and eyed it nervously.

The idiots apparently didn’t even notice him, or how politely he’d stomped up. Figured. They were sitting barefoot on the deck, coats and weapons lumped behind them as they leaned into the heat, totally engrossed in that spinning point. The Captain’s broad frame was bent into a slouch, left hand resting palm up on his knee as his fingers twitched in subtle waves, right hand shoved under his chin. Even focused as he was, Kidd shifted and jiggled his foot restlessly. To his right, Trafalgar Law – _honored_ guest, ally captain, and all-around creepy fucker – presented a leaner, stiffer slouch made mostly of angles. Trafalgar’s right hand was making the same twitches as Kidd’s left. On Kidd the gestures were familiar, like the deft motions he applied to his machines. Mirrored in Trafalgar’s tattooed hand, they were fucking spooky. Like he was picking up on Kidd’s movements, getting into his head somehow.

Okay, so they were practicing some joint, couple-y devil fruit power shit now. Adorable.

The spinning ball was blooming its red glow more on the top than the bottom. Both captains seemed to have picked up on this, and a growl from someone’s throat became a wobble in the ball.

“You’re losing it, shithead. More spin.” Kidd muttered tersely.

“This is all the _spin_ I am _able_ to sus _tain_ , while steadying your uneven pressure,” Trafalgar bit out with that clipped over-enunciation that signaled danger.

“So make the damn Room tighter.”

“That will _not_ help. It’s the inner pocket that’s difficult to… and THAT. Fucking stop. You keep jiggling it with your –“

“I’m not fucking jiggling… and it wouldn’t matter if you increased the speed.”

“Add spin, then.”

“What?” Kidd tightened his hand.

“Just match my spin with more…” Trafalgar jerked his free left hand to demonstrate a turning gesture “…on the ball itself. Follow my motion on the spin while I follow yours on the…thing…” a vague grasping gesture that tapered off into an impatient wave.

“Your…?” Kidd copied the turning gesture in his left hand a few times, apparently still at a loss. He grunted at Trafalgar, who scoffed back and tried offering a different gesture. Kid tried that but cut it off with another grunt, “… too broad. I’m not matching that. Messy.”

Trafalgar tilted his head and did the gesture stupidly slow.

Kidd did it with a stupid flourish.

Trafalgar flipped him off.

Killer listened to their bickering regress to the nonverbal and just about walked back the way he’d come. This was… uncomfortable, but not worse than their usual banging around, breaking the ship. Fuck them both, he had things to do.

That burning smell though. And… this burning ball in general. Very mysterious. Quite possibly explosive. Definitely a source of concern.

“Is that a cannonball?” He broke into the silence.

The idiots/captains jumped slightly, and the cannonball stuttered and stopped in seeming embarrassment. It quickly recovered and started back up again with extra force.

“I thought I told you to fuck off with that sneaky, jumping-out, judgey shit, Killer,” Kidd grumbled at his first mate.

“I stomped my way up here especially hard, as ordered, Captain.” Killer monotoned.

“Yeah well…” Kidd uncharacteristically passed over that small challenge, and returned to the one in front of him. “Yeah. It’s a cannonball. Not like we need many of those, with a sweet crew like ours.”

“So, what, uh…”

 _“Science,_ ” Kidd enthused.

“We’re seeing if we can get it to go molten—” Trafalgar offered with sudden earnestness.

“Set it on FIRE—”

“—since Kidd can actually finesse his control of metal when it’s in my Room here. Especially iron. He can compress it by attracting and repelling at the same time, and if he applies pressure while I spin…” Trafalgar launched into a whole run-on mumble-ramble that mostly escaped Killer. The molten ball was apparently just one experiment among many. Something about fuel, mumble mumble powder, something something oxide…?

Killer suspected that at least one of those things would turn out to be catastrophic somehow… but also, none of them jumped out as a way to kill, bludgeon, plunder or otherwise pirate a thing.

Sooo… “Why.”

The cannonball slowed again momentarily, a bit abashed. Then spun even harder.

“Fuck off with your sneaky judgey shit, Killer,” Trafalgar griped.

“Yeah Killer.”

“You’re doing less explosive and more nerdy shit than I’d expected, is all I’m saying.” Killer shrugged and came around to stand next to his captain. He was ignored as Kidd and Trafalgar sank back into their wordless rhythm.

The blue sphere had indeed tightened, the ball spinning smoothly and faster than ever, the red bloom spreading out to encompass both axes. The red brightened here and there only momentarily, lighter shades of orange peeking out but failing to intensify further.

He should leave them to... whatever this was, but Killer could still smell immanent disaster in the air. Of one kind or another. He had an especially refined nose for it, being first mate on Eustass fucking Kidd's ship.

He studied their faces in the shifting light. Their usual harsh edges and hard-learned vigilance were gone; they were open and unaware in a way that deeply unsettled him. Kidd’s dark lips were twisted in thought instead of mockery, red eyes wide and unguarded, protruding brow smooth. He’d tied his tangle of red hair back, like he used to when he and Killer worked in that South Blue scrap reclamation site. He hated remembering that time in their lives. They'd been such kids then... such stupid, trusting, vulnerable fucking kids.

Killer’s fretful tic jumped like a stab in the face.

He flicked his gaze over to the dark-haired viper next to the Captain, scrutinizing him as he’d done so often in the past month. But if Trafalgar could sense Kidd’s lowered guard he didn’t show it. His usual sharp half-sneer had lifted, and he was staring with unfiltered eagerness at some point beyond the spinning sphere. He was even biting his fucking lip. God, he was so open it rankled.

Maybe that was how he’d gotten to Kidd.

The ball wasn’t progressing much on the melting front. Kidd was trying out that gesture over and over with little variations, but nothing was changing. He hissed his frustration out his teeth and began jiggling his restless leg again.

Trafalgar hmmmed at him vaguely.

Then Kidd sighed and absently stroked his fingers down Trafalgar’s tattooed forearm, still watching the ball. His companion twitched belatedly at the unexpected touch, but didn’t dislodge it. They both paused like they were listening to something distant.

Moments dragged on.

Then Trafalgar slowly turned his hand palm-up, so Kidd’s fingers were just resting on his pulse, on the delicate tendons stretching just beneath his tan skin.

“… _Kidd_ ,” Killer hissed quietly. No response.

The acrid smell was back and the heat was beginning to get unbearable. The ball was now rapidly turning orange, with yellow creeping in. The clear blue sphere containing the small fireball was contracting somehow, pinching in at the middle and bulging at the ends. Neither of them were gesturing now, just sitting tensed and still, leaning into their work. Kidd’s manic grin was returning to his face.

“Law,” Kidd breathed, and Trafalgar hmmed in response.

“It’s not… the spin of the ball,” Kidd spoke in a detached whisper, “it’s a much smaller spin. Spins. It’s…”

The ball spun brighter, its glowing yellow bisected by the tightening blue ring of the Room’s midsection as it contracted, its ends ballooning out above and below.

“ _Kidd.”_ Killer said more loudly.

Kidd wasn’t listening. “…It’s everything inside spinning in different directions, or the same directions, at the same time… I know their spin by the sound. I can almost hear them all at once when they’re in the Room like this, like cupping my hands around my ear…”

Trafalgar’s grin grew to match Kidd’s. Kidd’s fingers traveled over those veins and tendons until his huge hand was ringing Trafalgar’s wrist, gripping…

“And if I can just set their spin in place, like, somehow…” Kidd was practically vibrating now, the glowing ball seeming to surge with his excitement. It flared with heat and light, before dimming slightly as it was obscured by a smoky grey shroud…

“KIDD!”

“Fuck's sake, Killer. WHAT.”

“Kidd, the FUCKING DECK is on FIRE.”

…

Once they’d dealt with that shit (easily enough; there were barrels of water and bags of sand handy for exactly such emergencies as idiot captains setting fire to their fucking ships), Killer made a point of leaning on the rail and staring stonily at Kidd. Trafalgar was reclining with his hands behind his head in a show of great nonchalance. He clearly thought all this was a hilarious diversion, but it wasn’t his goddamn ship that their experiments were in danger of incinerating.

Kidd had the grace to address the issue, in his own way. “Whatever, Killer. Isn’t this better than ‘Banging the fuck around breaking the ship’ or whatever you usually complain about?”

_Fuck no, setting the ship the fuck on FIRE is not better than breaking it the fuck apart._

“No,” Killer deadpanned.

Kidd snorted and scratched his head. “We’ll move it someplace off deck, okay? Like, out over the water so it’s away from the wood. That work for you, huh? We have your permission to continue, Killer?”

Killer paused for several meaningful seconds.

“Yeah.”

Law gave sharp little guffaw and directed a slight grin at Killer. Fucking prick.

Killer spread his hands in sarcastic defeat and pushed off the railing. He kicked the now-cooled cannonball toward the railing gap on his way past, just to get the final word in… and it curved in its path, toward another cannonball sitting to the side. He kicked it lightly again and it seemed to stick to the other ball.

…Weird.

He stalked off, studiously ignoring the low laughter and breathy whispers behind him.


End file.
